Headhunters (8 page)

“About the same,” Randall breathed, then I saw his face
break into a Cheshire grin and he looked over my shoulder to the swinging
kitchen door. There stood Agent Brock, his right arm bent and guarding his ribs
where I’d kicked him. With his other hand, he was holding his handkerchief to
his nose, trying to stop the bleeding. Behind him was Agent Vaughn and I
recognized him as the other agent from the cemetery. Vaughn’s eyes were
narrowed, analyzing the situation.

“Sorry, but I guess I didn’t bring enough Chinese food for
everyone,” I said.

Randall laughed behind me and Brock only glared.

“Quite alright, Simon,” Randall said. “I just need a moment
of your time.”

“Of course. Alaina? Do you mind?”

I offered the bag to Alaina and she took it, calling the
kids to come and help. She looked at Brock and made a face.

“Ew… I mean… are your okay?” she asked.

“I’m fine, ma’am,” Brock answered.

“Sorry about that back step,” I offered. “I will have to fix
that.”

I laughed good-naturedly and Alaina and the kids disappeared
into the kitchen to plate up the food. Once they were out of earshot, I turned
to Randall.

“What the hell is going on?” I growled.

“We need to talk alone,” Randall said, looking at his men.

Reluctantly they began to walk toward the front door, but I
wasn’t quite through with them.

“Hey.”

They turned and I offered the Glock to Brock, butt first.

“Don’t come around here again.”

Brock didn’t say anything, but took the Glock in his left
hand and pocketed it. They left through the front door without another word. I
turned back to Randall.

“Have a seat,” I said. “Looks like you’ve already made
yourself at home.”

“Simon, I apologize for coming here like this,” Randall
began. “But the situation is what it is. What do you know about Max Donovan?”

“I know what you told me. I know that I work for him,” I
said, scoffing. There wasn’t any point in tipping my hand yet. “What is this
all about?”

“Max Donovan is a black hat,” Randall offered. “He’s one of
the bad guys. He cracks corporations for profit and then sells the information.
He’s a techno-terrorist.”

“That’s a lie. I’ve never seen anything to indicate that.”

“Really?” Randall asked. “What’s his involvement in the
DHS?”

“DHS?” I asked, as if it were news to me. “Homeland
Security?”

“Stop it, Simon. I know you’re working on the project.”

I studied Randall, wondering if he was bluffing, knowing
that he wasn’t. I considered the possibility that he wasn’t really fishing for
information.

“I’m working on a federal project, yes. How does this
concern Blackthorn business?”

“Let’s stop playing games here, son. I know that Donovan is
working with the DHS. I know he’s doing security audits. I know that you helped
recruit and build the team that’s testing security.”

“You know a lot,” I said.

“What you don’t know is that the team you built has been
turned.” “Turned?” I asked, genuinely not understanding.

“Your DHS team… they’re assets. Assets that can work for
either side. Max Donovan told you they were assets to be used to improve
security. I’m telling you that Donovan is using them to exploit security.”

“And how do you know that?” I asked.

“Because he’s offering to sell the information to me,”
Randall replied.

I pondered that information for a moment. What Kendrick was
saying wasn’t impossible. It confirmed what I’d seen in the memo. And why else
would Kendrick be approaching me unless it was true?

“Wait… when did you know this about Max?” I asked.

“What do you mean?”

“When did you know that Max was a black hat? That he was
selling information?” I asked.

Kendrick weighed me and I knew the answer before he said a
word.

“You bastard…” I breathed. “You recruited me… you knew from
the beginning.”

“I didn’t know, Simon… I swear it to you,” he said.

I didn’t say anything to him at first.

“You suspected.” It wasn’t a question.

“I didn’t know for sure,” he shrugged.

I stood suddenly and Randall rocked back in his chair,
unsure if I was going to come for him or not. To be honest, I didn’t know
myself.

“You… did this… to keep me in,” I breathed. I tried to
temper my voice, to keep myself under control. “My wife is dead because of my
devotion to the work I did for you and after she was gone, you wanted to keep
me in…”

“Simon, I…” Randall began.

“No, not another word…”

“People could die because of what Max Donovan is going to
do,” Randall said.

“People have already died because of what you’ve done,” I
shot back. “Get out of my house. Get out of my life.”

Randall Kendrick stood slowly, his shoulders slumped. He was
defeated. I had turned him away. The one person he’d turned to time and again
and I’d turned him down flat.

“Randall…” I said, as he reached the door. He turned and
looked at me, his eyes reddened and sad. “I need to be clear about something
now. We’ve been friends for a long time. But this… you betrayed me, man. You
betrayed my trust. You’ve invaded my house and staked out my yard with agents
like I’m a terrorist. I want to be fair about this and draw the line where it
needs to fall. If you come near me or my family again, I will set your world on
fire and watch it burn. Can you understand that?”

I’d been calm in telling him this, my intention to give fair
warning, not to threaten. Randall nodded and then the smallest smile crept
across his face.

“Simon, we’re more alike than you know.”

And then he was gone.

***

We had dinner together that night.
Mel and David were their usual playful selves. David picked at his food,
excluding certain foods arbitrarily. Others, like the dumplings, he scarfed
down. I could tell Alaina was watching me, but not really knowing. Finally, she
blurted out her question across the dinner table.

“Were those…?” she began. I knew she was referring to Brock
and Vaughn.

“Yep.”

“And did you…?” she pointed at her nose with her fork.

“Yes, I did.”

She was quiet for a moment.

“Good,” she said finally.

I looked up from my plate and she was smiling faintly.

“So you really know how to…?”

“A little bit, yes…” I replied.

She stewed on that.

“Cool.”

***

After dinner, I put the kids to bed
and read them a proper bedtime story. On my way downstairs I saw the book
Kendrick had been reading to the kids. I picked it up and deposited it in the
kitchen garbage can, pulled the bag out, and walked it out to the can by the
garage.

With a moment alone, I pulled my cell from my pocket and
dialed Jess.

“Hello?” she said a moment later.

“Hi.”

“Are you okay?” she asked, reading my voice from that single
word.

“Been better.”

“Let me know if there’s something I can do…” her voice
trailed off and I knew she was concerned about me.

“Really, I’m okay,” I said. “Listen… I don’t really want to
get into it over the phone, but maybe we could talk tomorrow.”

“Simon, we talk every day,” I could tell she was smiling
from the way she said it.

“I know. I’m just thinking about us… about the future…”

“Hmm…” She said. I could tell she meant more than what she
said, but I understood the context. “Good stuff?”

“Good stuff,” I replied. I knew she was thinking more
amorous than business, but I wanted to start a business with her, get away from
Max and all the baggage that entailed. Maybe things weren’t that far gone.
Maybe I could still get away without having to run away.

“Well, talk to you tomorrow,” I said.

“’Night,” she replied and hung up softly.

I made my way up to bed and settled in. I tried to block out
the thoughts of the day. I knew that if Randall Kendrick wanted to do me harm,
he’d find a way, but he’d come to my house, sat in my chair and never raised a
finger.

I tossed and turned in my bed for a while and finally rolled
over, found the remote and turned on the TV. I watched Jay Leno’s monologue,
both guests, and then flipped around until Conan O’Brien came on… I was
beginning to doze near the end of his show when my cell phone rang. I sat up
and had to orientate myself again. Cell was in the pocket of my pants over the
chair. I retrieved it and answered before the third ring.

“Hello?”

“Simon…” the voice came across in a harsh whisper. “Simon…”

“Who… who is this?”

“It’s Chris… Chris Swenson…”

“Chris, it’s late. What’s going on?”

“I don’t know, man. I thought I was supposed to meet you
here. That’s what the e-mail said…”

“What? What e-mail? Chris you’re not making any sense…”

“I got an e-mail from you saying to meet you at the Donovan
offices in Chicago to talk about the DHS project. I came on the first flight
back out of Reagan National.” “Chris, I never e-mailed you.” I was awake now
and on alert.

Chris cursed under his breath.

“What’s wrong?” I asked.

“Someone was in the building, waiting for me,” Chris said,
still whispering.

“Waiting for you?” I asked.

“They’re trying to kill me…” Chris wheezed.

I tried to reply but before I could, I heard the distinctive
sound of a silenced gunshot followed by short scream of pain and panic. The
line went dead.

Chapter Eight

I parked the Volvo in my usual spot
and jumped out, sprinting for the door. I threw it open and ran across the
skywalk. I noticed that the security guard’s desk was vacant. I wasn’t familiar
with the nocturnal activities of corporate security but leaving one’s post unattended
didn’t seem to be standard operating procedure. I ran past the desk and
hesitated when I saw the elevators. The elevators had security cameras and I
wasn’t ready for that kind of exposure.  I threw open the door to the stairwell
and pounded up one flight after another.

At the seventh floor, I paused to catch my breath. I reached
under my shirt and unholstered the Glock 26. In the movies, the heroes always
checked to make sure the gun was loaded or pulled back the slide to chamber a
round before leaping into the fray. In reality, you don’t get this far only to
realize you came with an empty gun. Either you’re ready, or you’re not. I
reached for the door and readied myself for what waited on the other side.

I threw the door open and came in low, moving to my right,
away from the doorway, into the shadows until my shoulder hit the far wall. 
The Glock was pushed out in front of me, scanning for targets. I saw none.
Nothing was moving. The place was dark and quiet, just as it should be.

For a moment I wondered if it was a sick joke on Chris’
part. Had he called me to hassle me? To make me leap out of bed and look like a
fool, rushing to save him from some imaginary demise? Chris could be a
jokester, but he wasn’t the sort to do something like this.

I kept low, in a crouch, and followed the line of cubicles
down one side of the office space. Nothing. I paused, peeked up over the top of
the partitions. Prairie-dogging, they called it, when you poked your head up to
look out over the cubicle farm. It was then that I saw movement across the
office. A figure running.

I ducked down an aisle, keeping low, then came out the end
with the pistol leading the way. The figure was gone. I glanced around. We were
alone. I ran for the door the figure had gone through. It was a conference
room. Plenty of places to hide. I stopped outside. Breathe… ready… go! I ducked
inside, gun up and scanned the room. The figure was disappearing out the door
on the far side of the room. Before he was out the door, he hit the light switch
and the banks of fluorescent lights, blazed to life in the ceiling, blinding
me. I ducked out of the room, trying to recover whatever bit of nightvision I
could retain, my eyes struggling to adjust.

The intruder was doubling back to the stairwell where I’d
approached minutes before.  I circled back, careful not to blunder into an
ambush. I saw the man duck into the stairwell, but I noticed something wrong
with him. He seemed to hobbling, as if in pain. I wondered if this could be
Chris, thinking I was after him, trying to gun him down.

“Chris?” I said aloud, my voice wavering. “Chris?”

I pushed open the door and found Chris there, but it took me
a moment to recognize him. His face had been beaten in a way that takes time
and malice. Someone had worked him over… someone who wanted to extract
information from him. His face cracked into the smallest of smiles when he saw
me and he let out a sigh of laughter, but it only lasted a moment, before being
overtaken by a wince of pain as he tried to walk. I realized he had been able
to run… run when he thought it was for his life, but here in the presence of a
friend, the relief took his legs from him.

He reached for me to steady him and I saw that his hand was
covered in blood. I tried not to react, to let him see my face as I assessed
him, but the horror of it was too awful to keep it hidden. Chris had been shot
once in the side, the bullet passing through flesh without hitting vital
organs. He was bleeding badly, but it was the pain that crippled him more than
the wound.

Chris took a step toward me and his knee buckled. I stepped
in, trying to catch him, but the sheer weight of the man brought us both to our
knees. I cursed under my breath, tried to tell him that it would be alright and
knew that I was the worst liar for having said it. He slumped against me and I
felt pinned by him. I didn’t know how long he had or what I could do or how I
could get us out of this, but I knew that I had to be there for him.

“Chris, what happened, man?” I asked.

“Your email…” he wheezed.

“I didn’t send it,” I said. “That wasn’t me.”

Chris nodded.

“It was a fake… from your account,” Chris said.

“Who did this?” I asked.

Chris held up two fingers and I knew which two people did
it. Brock and Vaughn. Kendrick’s people. I asked anyway, and Chris confirmed my
suspicions.

“What do they want?” I asked.

Chris’ eyes narrowed, his head turned toward me and with a
Herculean effort lifted himself closer to me as if to share a secret. I leaned
down.

“They… want… you…” Chris said, his voice straining in
effort.

In that instant, the words barely escaping his lips, I heard
a silenced gunshot in the stairwell. The bullet struck Chris in the back of the
head. His body jerked and I must have cried out in shock because I heard the
echo. My body shuddered in shock and revulsion. Chris was dead.

I looked up and saw Agent Vaughn standing by the stairway
leading down. He’d crept up on us while we’d been talking and had killed Chris
in the moment before he could reveal more. Vaughn smiled and I saw the barrel
of his silenced Glock shift ever so slowly from Chris to me. I was next. There
was no question. I understood now what was happening, but I wasn’t ready to go
that easily.

I brought my right hand around Chris’ body and fired the
Glock at Vaughn. He must not have expected me to be armed. I shot him twice in
the chest, the jacketed hollowpoints ripping through his jacket. Vaughn
grimaced and fell back into the wall, dropping his gun and fell down the
stairs.

It was the gun that caught my attention. It was a standard
issue Glock 19. It was the weapon of choice of Blackthorn field agents. Agents
like Brock. Brock had used a gun like that. I looked harder. The gun lying on
the landing in the stairwell, wasn’t only a gun like Brock’s… it was Brock’s
gun. Brock had installed low profile Novak combat sights on his pistol, same as
this one.

It came to me then. I’d taken Brock’s gun from him when he’d
come to the house with Kendrick. I’d taken it from him… or had he let me take
it from him? My fingerprints were on the pistol. When I had handed the gun back
to Brock at the house, he’d taken it from me with the hand with the
handkerchief he’d been holding to his broken nose. I’d thought nothing of it at
the time, but he’d been trying to preserve my fingerprints on the gun. The gun
that had just been used to kill Chris. Vaughn had been wearing latex gloves.

I was being framed.

I heard footsteps on the stairwell. Someone was coming. I
pushed Chris off me and managed to get to my feet. I held out the pistol,
waited. The steps were moving away… Vaughn.

I picked up the Glock 19 pistol, checked the load and went
down the stairwell. There was no point in leaving the gun behind and letting it
be discovered by someone else. It was a powerful clue. Better to take it with
me than to leave it behind. Vaughn’s body was gone. Either I hadn’t hit him as
cleanly as I’d thought, or he was wearing a Kevlar vest. It would stop a
bullet, even at this close range. I’d have to make sure I put him down next
time.

I wound my way down and around the stairwell. The parking
garage level was just below Vaughn. I could see him now, his hand on the
railing as he ran ahead of me. I couldn’t let him get to the garage or I’d lose
him. Too many places to hide, too many traps that could be laid.

The level before Vaughn reached the parking garage, I tried
to kill him. I leaned of the railing and fired both Glocks. The sounds of the
gunshots in such close proximity was deafening. Vaughn reeled back from the
railing, narrowly avoiding the gunfire. He’d taken the door onto the floor above
the skywalk. He was trapped.

I flung open the door to the 4th floor and waited for
gunshots, but heard none. I was safely hidden from view, anxious about exposing
myself. Unfortunately, I had no choice. I threw the door open again and dove
in. I somersaulted into the room, careful not to stay silhouetted against the
light of the stairwell. I saw no movement.

Then I heard a crash and realized what a fool I’d been.
While I was playing games with the door, playing “shoot-don’t shoot”, Vaughn
had run to the back conference room and thrown a chair through the glass. He
was going to get away…

I ran toward the conference room just in time to see Vaughn
jump from the window. I feared that I’d look out after him only to see him fall
to his death. Instead, he fell about fifteen feet and landed on the skywalk
directly below us. He was running across the roof of the skywalk, headed toward
the parking garage. Vaughn was running, but felt confident enough to look back
at me and laugh.

I snap-aimed and fired once. The bullet hit Vaughn in the
upper back and sent him sprawling across the rooftop. I was shocked. I’d been
aiming for his head.

I jumped down onto the roof of the walkway and stalked
toward Vaughn. He was getting to his knees, trying to stand. I wasn’t about to
give him a chance. I aimed both pistols at Vaughn, but before I could pull the
trigger, he spun toward me, bringing up his backup pistol, a small .38 revolver
he kept in an ankle holster. Vaughn had me in his sights and fired.

I dropped, falling backwards as Vaughn fired at me. The
bullet passed over me and I landed hard on my back. Air rushed from my lungs on
impact, but I forced myself to return fire. I hit him in the chest and he spun
and fell from the skywalk, disappearing from sight. It took me a moment to
breathe again and when I did, I had to struggle for the strength to stand.

For the second time that night, I was hesitant to look to
see where Vaughn had fell, but this time, he was gone. He had vanished as
quickly as he’d appeared. I holstered my own Glock and put Brock’s pistol in my
back pocket. I looked again, but the agent was still gone. Nowhere to be found.

Then my phone rang. I answered it.

“Hello, son.”

Kendrick.

“Have you figured it out yet?” he asked.

“Kevlar. He was wearing a Kevlar vest,” I said.

“Of course he was,” Kendrick sounded irritated. The
observation was trite and obvious. “But Christopher Swenson wasn’t. You
shouldn’t have killed him, Simon.”

I couldn’t believe what I was hearing.

“I didn’t. You know that. You set me up,” I replied.

“Well, your file does indicate that you have paranoid
delusions. That’s what your psyche profile says,” Kendrick offered.

“That’s a lie,” I shot back. “You falsified reports in my
psyche profile?”

“That’s why you were released from Blackthorn,” Kendrick
explained. “You just weren’t stable after your wife’s death.”

“What is all of this about?” I demanded. “Just tell me
what’s going on!”

“It’s your last great act as a patriot, son,” Kendrick said.
“You bailed on me after Claire died. I understand that, Simon. Lord knows we
all need time. I needed time after Rose was murdered. But I used it. I turned
it. It became fuel for me to go on. There are casualties in every war. But we
fight on.”

“I was fighting that war with you, Randall. I just needed a
break!”

“No! Not a break! You wanted to quit. There is no time to
quit. We fight or we die. There’s no time to quit.”

Silence drove a wedge between us and I suddenly felt exposed
on the rooftop. I walked quickly back to the window managed to crawl back
inside.

“Son, I gave you nearly two years. Two years to heal. Two
years to mourn. Life goes on. It’s time to get back in the game. But you turned
your back on me. You refused to help your country when we needed you. So now,
you are going to be the cause of the next wave of the war on terror.”

“What are you talking about?” I asked.

“I’ll shoot straight with you, Simon,” he said. “Chris
Swenson is dead and his blood is on your hands. They are going to hunt you down
for that. And when they do, they’ll find the files in your house… on your home
computer.”

My mind raced. What files? There weren’t any files — The
night that I’d taken Alaina and the kids for the interview trip to Chicago
there had been a break-in. Ken Gibson from Alexandria PD had checked out the
house and said that nothing was missing. Which was true. They hadn’t taken
anything. They had put something on my computer…

“It’s a virus, Simon. Designed by the very best minds at the
NSA. It is unzipping and loading files full of top secret data onto your system
at your home. When the authorities come to investigate, you’ll be as guilty as
sin. A spy, a techno terrorist stealing this country’s secrets to sell
overseas.”

“The Homeland Security project…” I said.

“I had to get their attention if I wanted to keep my
funding,” Kendrick said. “You are a terrorist, son. You recruited Chris Swenson
to crack the DHS database. When you tried to turn him to give you more secrets,
he refused, so you killed him.”

“You’re a monster,” I seethed.

“I’m a product of my times, son,” Kendrick said. “I’m the
hand of justice when no one else wants to take the responsibility or the flack
or the lagging approval ratings. I am the last bastion of security in this
country and I will not be left out in the cold because of a coward like you!”

The silence fell between us. If Kendrick and I ever met
again, neither of us would offer mercy. We’d kill each other.

“The police are on their way to serve warrants on your house
right now,” Kendrick said. “They will seize your computer. Family Services will
take your children. The FBI and corporate security are closing in right now and
they’ll drag you out of that building. I will destroy your life the way you
promised to do to me.”